Still with his back to us standing, the
pilot went on with his story:—
“Instantly, all the people, with
looks of reproach and compassion,
Flocked round the prostrate woman.
The children cried, and their mothers
Hugged them tight to their breasts; but
the gambler said to the
captain,—
’Put me off there at the town that
lies round the bend of the river.
Here, you! rise at once, and be ready
now to go with me.’
Roughly he seized the woman’s arm
and strove to uplift her.
She—she seemed not to heed
him, but rose like one that is dreaming,
Slid from his grasp, and fleetly mounted
the steps of the gangway,
Up to the hurricane-deck, in silence,
without lamentation.
Straight to the stern of the boat, where
the wheel was, she ran, and
the people
Followed her fast till she turned and
stood at bay for a moment,
Looking them in the face, and in the face
of the gambler.
Not one to save her,—not one
of all the compassionate people!
Not one to save her, of all the pitying
angels in heaven!
Not one bolt of God to strike him dead
there before her!
Wildly she waved him back, we waiting
in silence and horror.
Over the swarthy face of the gambler a
pallor of passion
Passed, like a gleam of lightning over
the west in the night-time.
White, she stood, and mute, till he put
forth his hand to secure her;
Then she turned and leaped,—in
mid air fluttered a moment,—
Down, there, whirling, fell, like a broken-winged
bird from a tree-top,
Down on the cruel wheel, that caught her,
and hurled her, and
crushed her,
And in the foaming water plunged her,
and hid her forever.”
VI.
Still with his back to us all the pilot
stood, but we heard him
Swallowing hard, as he pulled the bell-rope
to stop her. Then, turning,—
“This is the place where it happened,”
brokenly whispered the pilot.
“Somehow, I never like to go by
here alone in the night-time.”
Darkly the Mississippi flowed by the town
that lay in the starlight,
Cheerful with lamps. Below we could
hear them reversing the engines,
And the great boat glided up to the shore
like a giant exhausted.
Heavily sighed her pipes. Broad over
the swamps to the eastward
Shone the full moon, and turned our far-trembling
wake into silver.
All was serene and calm, but the odorous
breath of the willows
Smote like the subtile breath of an infinite
sorrow upon us.
A DAY WITH THE DEAD.
“Good morning!” said the old custodian, as he stood in the door of the lodge, brushing out with his knuckles the cobwebs of sleep entangled in his eyelashes, and ventilating the apartments of his fleshly tabernacle with prolonged oscitations. “You are on hand early this time, a’n’t you? You’re the first live man I’ve seen since I got up.”
So saying, he vanished, and reappearing in a moment with a huge brass key, entered the arch, unlocked the gate which closed the aperture fronting the east like the cover of a porthole, and sent it with a heavy push wide open.